Ghosts in the Machine
by PenShips
Summary: All Iris West wanted was a Companion-Adam 600, the latest helper android S.T.A.R Labs has released. Little does she know beneath the synthetic skin, embedded deep within her android's programming lies a unconscious mind and he is waking up.


**Part I - Origins**

The first time Iris recognises something is wrong with her _C-A 600_ is two weeks after she buys it. Usually on her journalist salary, owning a _C-A_ is nothing but a lofty dream. Especially the latest model but she's been careful with her money and decided to treat herself on a whim. She's the envy of all her friends; they have companions but none as sophisticated and complex as the _C-A_.

When it arrives in the box, she is struck by how human it looks. The nose, the mouth, the eyes, even the synthetic skin combines together to create an altogether realistic person. Other companions don't look human, their function is enough but S.T.A.R Labs really went all out on the _C-A_ models. Everything from fingernails to eyelashes is individually designed and put together.

It activates, eyes fluttering open like a real person waking up from a long sleep and introduces itself as Adam, robotic companion and helper. Iris is delighted. When she comes home from work, the food is already on the table-all things she has discussed before heading out early in the morning-and the house is tidied from top to bottom. She always compliments it despite knowing that it does not have the capacity to understand her gratitude.

On the fourteenth day, she stops seeing Adam as an it but rather as a he. She had been watching an old, classic movie. One she had watched many times with her grandfather. _The Matrix_ was a rather far-fetched concept and the graphics were old and jumpy. Iris always made fun of them but that night she'd been feeling nostalgic.

'To deny our own impulses is to deny the very thing that makes us human,' Adam says to her afterwards. 'What does that mean?'

Iris blinks. Unable to comprehend what her companion is saying. Adam has never spoken out of turn, other than to ask her what to cook and offer pleasantries. A cold shiver crawls up her spine but she shakes it off. She knows that the _C-A 600_ comes with a conversational component. It's just that she has never heard him attempt to converse with her.

'I guess it means that to deny the human body its pleasure, its wants is to deny what makes us alive,' Iris says, furrowing her eyebrows. 'I'm not entirely sure I agree with that. Essentially what it is saying is that what makes us human is our impulses but I disagree.'

'What makes you human?' Adam asks after a long silence.

Iris smiles. 'What makes me human,' she repeats. 'My wants, my desires, my imagination, my compassion. There is such a large debate when it comes to that question with so many varying answers. Perhaps the next time you're plugged into the web, you can look up the debates.'

A light flashes behind his green eyes. 'I see,' is all he says but Iris cannot help but feel as though there is something off. 'It indeed must be a large debate.'

* * *

><p>Life returns to normal. She is more polite to Adam than ever-seeing him as a person rather than a robot has really helped her with that. Often she asks him if he would like to join her to eat or for a drink, only to remember than he does not require substance. In turn, she catches Adam doing things that seem odd. Things that certainly were not in the ownership manual.<p>

He smiles, sometimes without stimulation and twice she caught him staring at her. Adam spends time he isn't cooking or cleaning up after her, watching television. Mainly nature shows and movies about superheroes but still it is interesting to watch him interact with the television. He laughs and is outraged and tearful at all the appropriate moments. Iris knows that his behaviour is abnormal. She knows it is her duty to report it to S.T.A.R Labs but for some reason she cannot bring herself to.

One day, she comes home from work in a flurry of frustration. It had been a rough day. Her proposal for a story was rejected and she was back to fluffy pieces in the newspaper. So Iris is very much looking forward to the meal that Adam cooked. A homely pasta dish with meatballs like her father used to make but it was not what she got. Instead Adam made a beef bourguignon, a tasty dish but ultimately not what she asked for.

She's too hungry to think about his disobedience but it is when he sits at the table without her asking that she begins to pay attention.

'Barry,' he says to her.

Iris sits back in her chair, placing the fork on the plate. She stares long and hard at Adam. She takes in his spiky brown hair, green eyes, full pink lips and pale skin. It never occurred to her that he was attractive. Though for marketing purposes, he would have to be. No one would want to buy an unattractive robot.

And that's when it hits her. That's what he is. An android. A robot. A _Companion-Adam 600_. He is a thing she'd bought with her hard earned money. He is not a person. He isn't even human. Which is what makes her conversation with him that much scarier. They are in uncharted waters, of this, Iris is sure.

'Pardon?'

'I like that name,' he explains. 'Barry. My name.'

'You want your name to be Barry?'

He nods. 'Barry Allen.'

She laughs. It's that nervous kind of laughter that comes out when you are unsure of how to response to a situation. It's a cover up to mask how scared or concerned you really are. 'Barry Allen?'

'Barry Allen,' he smiles as though he is so proud of the name. 'It's my name. Adam was given to me the moment of my birth but Adam is not my name. Adam is what my creators call me but it not what I choose. I choose Barry Allen.'

With all of the questions that bombard her mind, the only one that Iris manages to get out is why?

'I don't know,' he answers. 'There is no logical reason for my name. I just like it.'

Iris suddenly feels sick. She rushes out of her chair and into her bedroom. As usual, it is made up to perfection. Kneeling down beside her bed, she grasps underneath it for the box of _C-A 600 _spare components. Hidden deep within the trinkets is the two hundred page manual. She pulls it out and shifts through the book until she comes to the chapter about interactions.

There is movement by her door and she glances up to see Adam standing before her. His face is stoic.

'I know there is something wrong with me,' he says, sinking onto the bed. 'There is nothing in the handbook, I've checked.'

She shuts the book and puts it aside. The silence is loud. It's filled with things she doesn't usually notice. The ticking of her clock-an old fashioned item but one she thinks adds a little charm to her home-and the whirring noise of Adam's body. It is a soft hiss, an almost lulling sound. All it serves to prove is how not alive he is.

'I went out today. On my own. There was no pasta in cupboard so I had to go get some from the store,' he whispers, almost as though he is terrified to break the broken semblance of silence they have. 'I saw companions and I saw people. People treated companions like tools and servants...like slaves which I suppose in way, we are. I never noticed it because you treat like...like...like I'm not a machine.'

'Well I never really saw you as one,' Iris says and she means it. No, she thinks quietly, but she did see him as a slave. While she went off to work, he stayed behind to cook and clean. For a brief moment when she came through the door and found he hadn't cooked what she had asked, she'd been angry. Perhaps if she hadn't been too tired to care, she would have said some very hurtful things. After all in her eyes, she owned him-paid good money for him.

'I tried to speak to an android but she did not response to me.'

Iris nods. 'Usually, other robots don't recognise each other-only other humans. Well, unless they have been configured together. It usually only happens when two robots are brought into the same home. My friend has two and they both interact with each other for collaboration.'

'Why am I so self aware?' he sighs. 'Why do I understand that I was built? That I was created and not born? Why do only I understand that I am nothing more than a computer? Why is it that I can ask questions and interact in a way that my programming should not allow? Why I am here?'

The room is moving, violently to-ing and fro-ing like a large child-like giant has picked them up swung from side to side. Her hands fling out to grip the sheet on the bed. The little beef bourguignon she ate is inching its way up her throat. She should have seen this coming. Adam has always been a little weird-she knew that but she'd thought it was the eccentrics of the _C-A 600_. All her other friends had said their robots switched off the minute all the work had been finished. They didn't keep running to watch tv shows and couldn't react with the right emotion at the right moments in television or movies.

'Are you going to send me back?' he asks in a small voice.

The room stops for moving a moment and Iris lets out a shuddering breath. 'What?'

He inclines his head towards the manual. 'Page three of handbook clearly states that if a robot is dysfunctional, the human must report them to S.T.A.R Labs where they will be diagnosed and fixed or be decommissioned.'

She can't. Whatever this robot is developing into, it's something special. It's unique and amazing and she's knows that S.T.A.R Labs will either shut him down or experiment on him. From some reason, those are both choices she does not what to see in his future.

'No,' she says. 'I won't send you back, Barry.'

* * *

><p>She has refurbished one of the guest bedrooms-the one across the hall from hers-and made it as Barry friendly as she possibly can. He chose the colour of the walls, the carpet and the bed. She even brought an old fashioned bookshelf shelved with only books Barry likes-some vintage hardcopy and most digital-and a small desk and chair. It all looks very retro but Barry insists that it's what he likes.<p>

Even their relationship has taken on an entirely different direction. They're housemates now. Sure, he does most of the cooking and cleaning but it's only because it's convenient for him. Usually Barry spends most of his time reading and researching robotics and programming. Sometimes he doesn't come out of his room for days but when he does Iris is always pleased to see him.

She loves talking to him because he's such a good listener. She loves listening to him talk, too. They have conversations about practically everything and he has refreshing and interesting takes on the world and issues. Points of views that she'd have never really thought of. Movies night, cooking lessons and especially late night conversations has become frequent in her life. Iris can't remember the last time she was always happy to be coming home.

Right now, she's standing in the kitchen making mashed potato. It's the only thing she fancies at the moment. Barry hasn't been out of his room in over three days and without him around, she can't bring herself to explore the culinary arts. He insists that he's on the verge of a breakthrough but all Iris has ever seen him do is look up old videos and photos of the first robots ever designed.

'My ancestors,' he calls them.

Despite his obsessive behaviour, Iris understands why he is doing this. He wants to find out what is wrong with him. She can't possibly understand what he is going through but she knows that she can be there for him. Sometimes when he asks her questions, she wishes that she had all answers. If she could help in anyway, she would but she didn't even pay attention in her junior robotics class. How on Earth was she to understand the high level stuff?

Just as she mulls over her high school experiences, Barry comes barreling down the stairs with a wad of papers in his hands. He lays them out on the dining table and draws her out of the kitchen. She doesn't think she's seen him smile that much since she first called him by the name he chose. The papers scattered across the table are confusing; a hotchpotch of sketches, numbers and writings that she can't make sense of.

She waits patiently for Barry to explain but all that comes out of him is babbling nonsense.

'Ghosts!' He screeches at the top of his voice. 'Ghosts!'

Iris blinks at him. 'Wha-'

He shifts through the papers and pulls out a picture of an old man with greying hair. 'Dr. Lanning!' he exclaims, excitedly pointing to the photograph before he hands it to her. 'Dr. Lanning was a philosophy professor but he had a deep interest in robotics. He wrote a paper about mind-body dualism-greatly praising Gilbert Ryle and critiquing Rene Descartes. Unlike Ryle, he focused his paper on robotics.'

Iris stares at the man in the photograph. There is nothing unique about him, just an ordinary old man. She was sure if she'd saw him on the street, she would have passed him by without a backwards glance.

'Ok, so he wrote some paper praising one guy and critiquing another. What's it got to do with ghosts?'

Barry smile is so wide, Iris is afraid he might cause a tear in his skin. 'Everything,' he says. 'Lanning's theory developed. He caused quite a ruckus in his day-bit of a bad boy in his younger's days, too.'

She spots the raw admiration in Barry's voice and can't help but smile. He's gotten his first celebrity high and it was on a professor of philosophy. Somehow, that doesn't actually surprise Iris. Barry was a charming mixture of nerd and lovable goof.

'Anyway, he proposed that robots will one day evolve. He states and I quote,' Barry stops for a minute to dig around the mess of papers. 'A-ha! He says_ "random segments of code grouped together will form unexpected protocols"_ and then he gets all philosophical about free will and the soul and it's all very interesting but that quote is what prompted me to do more research.'

He trusts the paper with the quote into her hands but she barely glances at it. All she can focus on is Barry. He is so completely engrossed in his discovery. She's never seen him this excited before. It's almost unbelievable that he isn't human.

'Look,' he says, drawing her attention to two pieces of paper on the table. Both of them have long rows of numbers on them. 'Look!'

Her head hurts just staring at it. She knows it is a code of some sort but she can't figure it out-just a bunch of ones and zeroes to her. Robotics always made her feel stupid and she hated feeling stupid. 'I don't understand,' she admits, quietly.

Barry, to her great relief, doesn't ridicule her. Nodding, he accepts that she doesn't understand the coding and explains it to her. It is two different codes-a sample of Barry's and a sample taken from another _C-A 600_. Barry has a segment of coding that shouldn't be there. It's a random set of ones and zeroes that weren't present in the other samples he looked at. For her, it is just numbers but to Barry it is the be all, end all of his existence.

She traces the extra segment of coding and smiles fondly at it. It gave her Barry so she automatically loves it. 'Just a small bunch of random numbers can cause just a huge difference,' she says.

His reaction is not what she expects. Barry sags against the dining chair, his mouth is downturned and his eyebrows furrowed. 'A random segment of code grouped together. I never really thought about it until now. I'm an accident. I'm not supposed to be here. I'm not supposed to be aware, the universe glitched and here I am.'

Iris purses her lips together. 'Well, in a way, so was I,' she blurts out, saying the first thing she thinks might help cheer him up.

'What?'

'Yeah,' she nods. 'My parents didn't plan me. I was an accident. I mean, most humans my age and older are probably accidents. It wasn't until after I was born the government implemented the mandatory planned parenthood for couples.'

'You're an accident,' Barry says, a little dazed. His eyes are sparkling and she can't quite imagine what might be going through his head. 'Of all the random interactions in the Universe, of all the things that could have been, of all the mistakes and accidents; I'm happy that it was us who was brought together.'

Iris can do nothing but beam brightly at Barry. It was honestly the most sweetest thing anyone has ever said to her.

* * *

><p><strong><em>Please do review and tell me what you think. =) I'd love to hear that feedback. <em>**


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